#10 Marc Andreessen

The poster boy for the Web 1.0 generation is successfully reinventing himself as a Web 2.0 venture capitalist. He debuts high on our list because of his seed investments in Twitter and LinkedIn, and gets points for his firm’s later stage investments in Groupon, Skype and Zynga. Andreessen plans to model his firm Andreessen-Horowitz after Hollywood’s Creative Artist Agency back in its heyday, when onetime super-agent Michael Ovitz built C.A.A. into the Yankees of Hollywood.
That has some eyes rolling on Sand Hill Road but as cofounder of Netscape, Opsware and Ning, the web wunderkind has street cred with entrepreneurs--notably Mark Zuckerberg, who asked him to join Facebook’s board. Andreessen also serves on the boards of eBay, Skype and Hewlett-Packard. The entrepreneur he would most like to back? “Steve Jobs, no question,” says Andreessen.
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The Forbes Global 2000 are the biggest, most powerful listed companies in the world. These global giants usually reorder themselves at a glacial pace but sometimes, as with the volatile financial sector of late, with more abruptness. View complete list »